“I may be wrong in regard to any or all of them; but holding it a sound maxim, that it is better to be only sometimes right, than at all times wrong, so soon as I discover my opinions to be erroneous, I shall be ready to renounce them.”

“I don't like that man. I must get to know him better.”

“I am slow to learn and slow to forget that which I have learned. My mind is like a piece of steel, very hard to scratch any thing on it and almost impossible after you get it there to rub it out.”

“you can have no conflict, without being yourselves the aggressors”

“Those who write clearly have readers, those who write obscurely have commentators.”

“I have never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration of Independence. --February 22, 1861”

“The hen is the wisest of all the animal creation, because she never cackles until the egg is laid.”

“I don't like to hear cut and dried sermons. No—when I hear a man preach, I like to see him act as if he were fighting bees.”

“It is not in our forming battlements or bristling seacoasts, or our Army and Navy that makes America great - but rather our reliance in the law of liberty and the religious law God has planted in us.”

“We the people are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts, not to overthrow the Constitution but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution.”

“If I am killed, I can die but once; but to live in constant dread of it, is to die over and over again.”

“What is conservatism? Is it not the adherence to the old and tried against the new and untried?”

“RESPONSE TO POLITICAL SMEAR TO ROBERT ALLEN New Salem, June 21, 1836 DEAR COLONEL:—I am told that during my absence last week you passed through this place, and stated publicly that you were in possession of a fact or facts which, if known to the public, would entirely destroy the prospects of N. W. Edwards and myself at the ensuing election; but that, through favor to us, you should forbear to divulge them. No one has needed favors more than I, and, generally, few have been less unwilling to accept them; but in this case favor to me would be injustice to the public, and therefore I must beg your pardon for declining it. That I once had the confidence of the people of Sangamon, is sufficiently evident; and if I have since done anything, either by design or misadventure, which if known would subject me to a forfeiture of that confidence, he that knows of that thing, and conceals it, is a traitor to his country’s interest. I find myself wholly unable to form any conjecture of what fact or facts, real or supposed, you spoke; but my opinion of your veracity will not permit me for a moment to doubt that you at least believed what you said. I am flattered with the personal regard you manifested for me; but I do hope that, on more mature reflection, you will view the public interest as a paramount consideration, and therefore determine to let the worst come. I here assure you that the candid statement of facts on your part, however low it may sink me, shall never break the tie of personal friendship between us. I wish an answer to this, and you are at liberty to publish both, if you choose. Very respectfully, A. LINCOLN.”

“Determine that the thing can and shall be done and then... find the way.”

“Must is the word... You can not fail if you resolutely determine that you will not... Always bear in mind that your resolution to succeed is more important that any other thing.”